


The Construction Tree

by jugheadjones



Series: Merry Christmas, Baby! [5]
Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Christmas, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-27 03:36:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17154554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jugheadjones/pseuds/jugheadjones
Summary: Every year, Andrews Construction raises a charity tree, decorated with the wishes of children in need. With FP in prison, and Gladys somewhere in Toledo, Jughead and Jellybean's wishes will be on the tree for the first time - as foster kids, they have the privilege of writing out what they want most on white tags and hoping a kind stranger will take pity on them. Trouble is, the only thing Jughead wants doesn't come from a store.The only thing Jughead wants is for Archie Andrews to love him back.





	The Construction Tree

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kaeltheking](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=kaeltheking).



> wishing a very very wonderful happy holidays to everyone, may all your wishes come true!

**December 2**

“It’s December,” says Ms. Lovett, Jughead’s English teacher. Her red-painted nails, as high-gloss and reflective as Rudolph’s nose, _ tap-tap-tap _ on the cover of that semester’s required novel. She paces across the floor of the classroom, decorative baubles swinging from her ears. “Time for you all to start thinking about what you want your parents to buy you.” 

This remark earns her a few chuckles, and what Jughead imagines is a thoughtful nod from Veronica Lodge, two rows ahead of him, her delicate spike heels resting on the floor under her chair. Ms. Lovett has reached the front of the class and turns, the sudden movement drawing the attention of the few students whose gazes had been turned to the falling snow outside the windows. 

_ Parents _ , thinks Jughead. His father is in prison and his mother has disappeared from his life altogether. What he can expect under the tree on Christmas morning is the furthest thing from his mind.  _ What parents? _

“But before you do,” says Ms. Lovett, holding up a cautionary finger. “I want you to spare some thought to the essay that is due at the beginning of January. Don’t put it on hold for the holiday season.” 

The class groans. Jughead looks across the row to his best friend, who would usually have joined in on the groaning. Archie, beside the window, is still staring at the snowflakes, uncharacteristically still. Jughead looks at his broad shoulders, the taut red sweater, the freckles on the back of his neck, and then looks guiltily away. December is not a good time to have a crush on your best friend. But here he is. 

“Let’s put aside To Kill A Mockingbird for now,” says Ms. Lovett and does, plunking the book on her desk with almost inappropriate finality. “Today we’re going to do some creative writing. I’m setting a timer for fifteen minutes.” 

Jughead stares at Archie again, as though searching for inspiration. Archie would not be out of place as a writer’s muse. The white light coming in the window puts a little halo of sun around his orange hair, lighting it on fire. His brow is furrowed as he stares past the glass, looking adorably thoughtful. Jughead stares and wishes he could see into his brain. 

“Here’s your prompt,” says Ms. Lovett. “What is Christmas really about?” 

Reggie Mantle’s hand shoots way up in the air. “But I’m JEWISH,” he bemoans loudly, relishing in the disruption this causes the lesson plan. Archie’s head turns away from the window at last. “Why should I write about Christmas?” 

Nancy Woods, whose hand had been sneaking up to ask the same thing, puts it back down. 

Ms. Lovett purses her lips. “This is a good time to be creative. Think of a way you can adapt the prompt for Hanukkah.” 

“Can I write about Chinese New Year?” Kim Wong wants to know. 

Ms. Lovett’s lips purse so tight she gets wrinkles. “Yes. Write about any holiday you celebrate.” 

Archie looks back at the window, his expression torn. Jughead celebrates Christmas only for the sake of convenience: he is confident FP has never set foot in a church in his life. Archie’s parents are different: Mary’s family is Jewish, and Fred’s relatives are all Christian. In December, Archie gets what Jughead’s mom used to call “a big, happy, Hanukkah-Christmas mishmash.” 

This means Andrews have a menorah in their front window and still tromp out as a family to cut down their own Christmas tree. When Mary was here, she would let Jughead help her make potato latkes, served hot with heaps of applesauce and garnished with little sprigs of dill. The Andrews house always smelled beautifully of onion and potato all winter long. Jughead can’t think about winter without thinking of that smell. 

Fred had a rule that there was no decorating for Christmas until Hanukkah was over, but Mary allowed him the exception of his records: Christmas songs floated out from the needle of his ancient turntable as soon as the calendar turned over. Jughead remembers watching them slow-dance on the first day of the season: Fred’s chin tucked into Mary’s shoulder, both of them vibrating with the thing called _ love _ . Jughead had never seen two people fit together so perfectly. 

It must be different, after the divorce. Fred could never make latkes like Mary could. 

“Why don’t we get into groups?” Ms. Lovett asks. “Then you can proofread each other’s work.” 

Archie is out of his desk like a shot, hurrying to Veronica’s seat. Betty and her seatmate Nancy flock after them, filling in the cluster of desks in that row. Betty leans close into Archie’s space, her smile Christmas-bright and twinkly. Archie beams back at her. 

“Groups of four,” says Ms. Lovett affirmingly, placing her scarlet-taloned hand on Archie’s back and looking around the room for outliers. “Don’t waste time, now.” 

Jughead shrinks low in his seat and hopes he won’t be put with Reggie. 

* * *

 

“Jug!” 

The final bell has rung, and students are streaming in groups down the front steps, relishing in the brand-new snow. Jughead turns, his heart giving a traitorous leap at the sight of his best friend hurrying toward him. Veronica is making eyes at him from her locker, but for once Archie doesn’t seem to notice her. He reaches Jughead’s locker and leans against it, shoulder thumping into the aluminum. 

“My dad wants to know if you want to help us put up the construction tree.” 

The construction tree. Because no one in town had a heart like Fred Andrews did. If you had asked  _ him _ what Christmas was really about he would have told you love, baby, all love. Jughead’s chest hurts. He wants his father back. 

“Sure,” he says instead. “If you need help.” 

“My dad has hot chocolate,” says Archie, and flashes that million-dollar smile, the one that made Jughead’s stomach kind of cramp up. Sometimes he tries to imagine pity in that smile, that Archie’s kindness is only due to the fact that Jughead is spending the holiday season in foster care. But he can never convince himself. Archie is only genuine. “Marshmallows, too.” 

Jughead cracks a smile. “You don’t need to convince me. I already said yes.” 

It takes a long time for them to leave. First, Archie has to turn down half a dozen offers for hot cocoa at Pop’s, and the chance to judge a snowman-building contest. Reggie pelts him with a few fresh-scooped snowballs, and Archie laughs and calls out: “I’ll get you later.” 

No one talks to Jughead. He doesn’t have to promise to get anyone later. 

They stop at the elementary school to pick up Jellybean. Her face lights up when she sees them, and she runs pell-mell into Archie’s arms, howling with joy. 

“You never see us anymore!” Jughead’s sister yells accusingly, stomping her foot on the snow. Jughead winces - the worn sole of her combat boot is peeling away so that the outer layer flaps like a tongue. Jellybean doesn’t seem to notice. “We live on Birch Street now, Archie. B-I-R-” 

“I know, JB,” laughs Archie, and grabs her by her worn-out mittens to spin her in a circle. Jellybean laughs, and all is forgiven. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” 

Birch Street is where the Malloys live, an older couple that neither Jughead nor Jellybean has yet managed to start calling their  _ parents _ . Jughead knows he’s lucky - most siblings put in the foster system don’t get to stay together. The Malloys had taken Jellybean under pressure, when Ms. Burble, his caseworker, had all but dumped her into their arms. 

“We usually only take one,” Mrs. Malloy had said. “Older kids.” 

“We don’t have the energy for two,” Mr. Malloy had agreed. “Or the money.” 

Jellybean, at ten, was too young for the Malloys. Jughead was self-sufficient and silent, only asked for meals and an internet connection. He kept his bitterness inside him, like molten lava in his core. Jellybean was loud in her displeasure, asked too many questions of the world. She wanted attention, wanted company and comfort and car rides to the movies. She wanted _ time _ . 

“Just for a few months,” Ms. Burble had insisted. “For Christmas. A month, even. Until we get things sorted.” 

There was a backlog of needy children in Riverdale. FP’s jail sentence was long. Things never seemed to be sorted. 

Jughead lived in fear of the day the Malloys decided it was too much and returned either one of them. Or both. He had a sneaking suspicion it would happen after the holidays - pictures the long Return lines at the mall, only this one for kids. Kids who wanted too much. The molten lava starts to burn his stomach when he thinks about it, like a case of the world’s worst heartburn. 

Jellybean starts scooping handfuls of snow for snowballs, and Jughead and Archie duck and run, pretending to fire some back without aiming. When they tire each other out they only walk: Jellybean a little behind them, tromping faithfully with her worn-out boots in the footprints that Jughead leaves behind. 

December is dangerous. Snowfall is dangerous. There are so many things to believe in. 

Fred has the tree upright in the stand he’d built when they get there. The sleeves of his green flannel shirt and rolled up to his elbows, and the paperwork that usually clutters his desk has been overrun by a sagging cardboard box, bursting with decorations. He lifts Jellybean up in a hug when he sees her, his tired face lighting up with surprise. 

“JB!” When Fred says your name you feel like the greatest person on earth. He spins her all the way around in a circle and puts her back down. “Good to see you, kiddo.” 

Jellybean wriggles out of his grasp. “We came to decorate.” 

“Have at it.” Fred flings his arms wide, showing off the bare tree, slightly lopsided in the homemade wooden stand. “I want to see garlands. Popcorn strands. Jingle bells. Then the youngest gets to put the star on top.” 

“Did you get lots of names?” Jellybean wants to know. She bounces up and down on the toes of her boots, the rubber flapping. Jughead wonders how much a new pair of boots costs. His fingers itch to count the change in his wallet. He could buy a pair on the way to school tomorrow. 

“Tons. And Pop’s doing a tree this year, too!” Fred’s voice is full of joy. It shines out of every part of him, making him look ten years younger. “We’re going to have more kids getting Christmas presents than ever.” 

Once a year, Andrews Construction partners with the Greendale-Riverdale chapter of the Children’s Aid Society and sets up a Christmas tree in the construction trailer. Local children who need a Santa Claus - foster kids, kids from low-income families, kids in the hospital - write their names and Christmas wishes on paper ornaments. Fred’s workers take them home and buy the gifts written on the tags. Jughead likes to hear them bicker in the afternoons, vying for their favourite gifts. If no one took a certain tag home, the construction workers would insist it be taken care of. 

“Keslow’s had his lego set on this tree for two weeks!” Vic, the foreman, would holler out. “I don’t want anyone leaving here until someone’s picked him out.” 

They empty the tree. They always do. At the end of the month, Archie and his dad wrap all of the gifts and truck them out to the Children's Aid. From there they go to the families, just in time for Christmas morning. It’s the kind of magic you can touch. Jellybean is too old to believe in Santa, but she loves the chance to play Santa herself. 

Jughead’s tag is not on the tree, because Mrs. Burble has not been to his house yet to ask him and Jellybean to fill them out. That means Jughead’s tag will hang on the tree at the Chok’lit shop, where all of his peers go after school, on display. The thought that none of them know his real name is Forsythe hardly soothes him. He doesn’t want any of them to see what he is begging for. What he and his sister will have or not have, depending on their charity. 

“I want all the baseball kids,” says Fred, as Archie is poking through the shoebox of ornaments. This is the first thing Fred does every year: he checks every tag for children who are asking for baseball mitts and buys them gloves, bats, balls, and all kinds of gear. Baseball equipment is hard to wrap, but Fred does it. Relentlessly, faithfully. With love. 

One day, Jughead wants a family who loves like that. 

Carefully. Faithfully. 

Year after year. 

* * *

Ms. Burble is in the Malloys living room when they get home. Jughead knows, realistically, that she is only here about the ornaments. But he thinks of packages returned after the holidays: sweaters that are the wrong colour, shoes that are the wrong size, and he feels nervous. 

“Hello Jughead,” she says to him, putting on her nicest social worker smile. She is trying to win him over by using his chosen name instead of his real one. Jughead does not smile back. Jellybean follows his lead and scowls. 

“It’s coming up on Christmastime,” Mrs. Burble says, and withdraws two paper ornaments from her purse: one a snowman, and one a star. Mr. Malloy hovers, watching them, and Jughead’s skin bristles. “These are getting hung up in Pop’s Chok’lit shop, downtown. We’re going to write down your name, age, and a Christmas present you want. Obviously, there are no promises, but I think we have a good chance a kind stranger might get something for you.” 

Her smile is directed at Jellybean this time, who sits in the middle of the sofa, looking at her toes. Jughead knows he has no reason to hate Mrs. Burble. She is only doing her job. But that heartburn flares up in his stomach again, his hands curling into shaky fists. 

“What would you like for Christmas, JB?” Ms. Burble is writing  _ Forsythia _ on the tag. She follows it with a comma and Jellybean’s age.  _ 10. _

Jellybean seems to be thinking hard. She bites her lip, the way Jughead’s mom always used to when she was poring over utility bills. Her blonde eyebrows scrunch together. In her combat boots, skinny jeans, and black turtleneck, she looks like the world’s smallest adult. 

“A new record,” she says finally, and Jughead’s heart turns over with love for his sister. “Pink Floyd.” 

“Vinyl is expensive,” says Mr. Malloy with a frown. 

“A CD,” suggests Mrs. Burble, quickly, before Jughead can get up and slug his foster parent in the neck. “Would that be all right?” 

It would not be all right. But the Malloys have a CD player and no record player, and Jellybean nods like it doesn’t matter. Santa will bring her one gift this year. No, scratch that,  _ a kind stranger. _ And it won’t even be what she’d wanted in the first place. 

Ms. Burble writes it down.  _ Forsythia, age 10, wants a pink Floyd CD.  _

She spells it like that, capitalizing the Floyd and not the Pink and Jughead wants to rip it out of her hands and do it right. Stab her through the eye with her ballpoint. Instead, he sits very still, and stretches his shaking fingers out on his legs, doing his best to keep the anger where it belongs. 

Ms. Burble is looking at him. “And you, Jughead?” 

Her pen is poised over the snowman, ready to write  _ Forsythe _ . Jughead stares at the paper and thinks  _ I want my father out of jail. I want my mother back. I want everyone who hurt us to suffer.  _

“JB can have mine,” he says. “I don’t need anything.” 

He knows what he wants for Christmas: a new hard drive for his computer, and a typewriter if he was a person whose friends had Reggie Mantle kind of money. But that’s not the kind of thing that some kindly adult picking up his cheeseburger will want to spring for. No use in being one of the ornaments left on the tree on Christmas eve. 

“How about clothes?” Ms. Burble asks. “Shoes? You like to read, Jughead: a book?” 

_ I want to visit my father in prison. I want my sister to not have a father who’s in prison. I’m in love with Archie Andrews and I want him to love me back.  _

“She can fill out mine too,” Jughead says firmly. “She needs new boots. That way she can have something fun and something useful.” 

He hates admitting that. Hates saying it in front of Jellybean’s face, playing adult, like a traitor. Mr. Malloy looks at Jellybean’s feet, apologetic. 

“I can take her to the Children’s Place after dinner,” he says, and Jellybean flinches. They both know the kind of boots Mr. Malloy will pick out: they will be purple and soft and meant for kids who don’t know what a .45 is. But his heart will be in the right place, and Jellybean will wear them because she has no other choice. 

“I’m going to fix them,” says Jellybean, glaring at Jughead for bringing it up. Combat boots with a floppy sole is better than having none. “With tape.” 

“Well, Jughead?” Ms. Burble asks. Her pen is hanging over the paper snowman. Jughead meets her gaze, evenly, and says nothing. Ms. Burble waits, but Jughead can wait longer. He has a lifetime of experience being a pain in the ass. 

“I’ll just leave it here, then,” says Ms. Burble, finally. “And you can fill it out when you’re ready. Then give me a call, and I’ll come to pick it up.” 

“Thank you,” says Mr. Malloy, the syllables exaggerated, stressing how difficult Jughead is making all of their lives. Jughead feels his time with the Malloys wearing thin, like old flannel. “So much. We appreciate it.” 

* * *

He helps Jellybean fill out her homework, though Jellybean’s progressed past the need for his help and only wants his company. He watches the back of her neck as she writes, pen gliding effortlessly over the page as she fills in numbers and sums. Jellybean might be the smartest of all of them when it came to schoolwork. He scoops the hair off the back of her neck for her, tugs it gently back into a ponytail where it had begun to hang down onto her paper. 

“You can fill out that ornament,” he says. “I meant it. I’m not going to.” 

Jellybean keeps writing. “I want you to have something.” 

“Then you fill it out for me,” he says, and twists the ponytail so it flops from left to right over her ears. Jellybean giggles and bats his hands off. 

“Snitchy-snitch on the boots,” she says. “Now I have to wear Dumbo shoes from the Children’s Place.” 

“You can’t walk around with your boot flopping off,” Jughead argues. He forces a smile. “We’d hear you coming from a mile away.” 

Jellybean sets her pen down. She looks at Jughead, her eyes reflecting the kind of softness that makes her look like Gladys, full-grown. 

“I’m glad we have each other,” she says, a phrase so heavy that no ten-year-old should have to utter it, only JB’s always been wise beyond her years. 

She squirms obligingly into Jughead’s arms when he hugs her, tight, those words ringing in his ears as he thinks of Mr. Malloy saying _ we don’t have the energy for two, or the money _ . The Malloys had more than the Jones’ had had, but Mrs. Malloy still stared forlornly at the red ink at the bottom of the credit card bills that came in the mail, Mr. Malloy still wore a tired old jacket to work that frayed at the sleeves, and both Jughead and Jellybean knew how that was. 

Children’s Aid had tried to reach Gladys in Toledo. Jughead had tried to reach Gladys in Toledo. Even Fred Andrews had tried to reach Gladys in Toledo. 

Gladys Jones had been unreachable. 

* * *

He takes Jellybean on a drive that night, far out of the Malloys’ neighbourhood and up to the place where Betty lived, all softness and powder snow and light. Jellybean likes to look at the holiday decorations, and she exclaims over every star, every candle, every glowing tree. 

Jughead does not look at the lights. He looks at the windows. 

Jughead has spent a lifetime looking in windows, an outsider in every world. In his kinder hours, he thinks it’s what makes him a writer: that he has always been meant to observe human behaviour. These windows are special. The people behind them have trees and fireplaces and families. They hustle and argue and cook and laugh. 

What is Christmas really about? All the movies and cards would suggest it was homeownership. Own a house with a chimney and you were set. Everything would turn out all right. 

Jughead doesn’t have a house or a chimney. But maybe he has hope. 

He stops at Archie’s house, but Archie’s gone out - a date with Veronica or Betty or Valerie or some other girl. Jughead sinks low in the seat when he gets back in the car and pretends not to mind. The Andrews’ window beams light out onto the snowy lawn, gold and beautiful, a menorah glowing in the centre. 

He clicks on the radio as they back out of the driveway and turns it to the classic rock station for Jellybean’s sake. It’s too early for 107.9 to be playing Christmas rock - Bruce Springsteen won’t sing  _ Santa Claus is coming to town _ over the airwaves until the twentieth, at least, when Fred’s vinyl record of it has all but worn out. But Pink Floyd is playing. 

It gives him a little chill: a frightening thought that maybe Christmas had got in the car with him, somehow, that his Hope had been rewarded and this was a sign. Hope frightens Jughead: it feels dangerous and too close to him. It came whether you believed in it or not. Jughead was a cynic to end all cynics, and still, he had it in him. He had had it when he showed up outside Archie’s door, parked in the triangle of window-light, the flickering of safety and family and warmth. 

Hope. 

“How I wish” warbles Jellybean, off-key - none of the Jones’ are singers. “How I wish you were here.” 

Jughead joins in, and something like peace creeps in his chest: the two of them in the darkened car, warm and safe for now. “We’re just two lost souls swimming in a fishbowl… year after year.” 

They sing all the way back to the Malloy’s house. They are not yet able to call it home. 

* * *

**December 15**

He has loved Archie for as long as he has known the word, when his kindergarten teacher had stretched her lips around the O of it and said  _ we love our friends _ , and yes, this should even include Reggie Mantle, even when he slops purple paint on your canvas at activity time when you were trying to paint a blue sky. 

When you’re four you don’t need to know that love and friendship are different. Sometimes,  _ often _ , Jughead wishes they were still one-and-the-same - that the violence of growing up had not sliced the peaceful-sounding word into its parts: sex, romance, dating, divorce, marriage. Love was simpler and warmer, like a red Christmas stocking. You could hang it on the tree like a Christmas ball. 

Yet the thing in his chest that he has to call Love just for the force of it does not feel as pretty. Greed is not allowed at Christmas, but Jughead is greedy, and Archie is the reason. His greed-driven love is green and prickly in the thorny tangle of his heart. Jellybean’s favourite Christmas song - the deeply uncharitable one about the Grinch’s appearance - would be an apt description. 

He can’t place when friendly love had ceased to be sufficient, when the miserly part of his heart had begun to count, Scrooge-like, the hours Archie spent with him compared to the hours he doled out for his dating life. Jealousy, and Jealousy’s sibling: pining. In the day he can forget about it, but in the dead of night, staring at the blue of his ceiling, he feels it in him like a tunnel that goes on forever. 

He’s lost count of things like childhood sleepovers, nights tucked up together in the blue-and-white striped bedsheets of Archie’s twin bed or toe-to-toe in the treehouse their fathers had built for them before their own feud had torn them apart. Their youth is a shared one: twisted together like a pretzel. They had been  _ ArchieandJughead  _ from the day four-year-old Archie had accosted him on the playground to boldly inform him that they ought to be friends. 

Then high school had happened and they had slipped - or maybe only Jughead had slipped, tumbled off some precipice that Archie had charged up without effort, left behind like a forgotten mitten on the bus. And they had come together and apart in the past few months, since Jason, since everything, like figure skaters executing a dreadfully complicated dance - together, apart, together, apart, but never close enough for his liking. He wants to stretch his hands out into Archie the way you reach for a fire, close enough to burn. 

They’re sitting by the fireplace now: Archie on his stomach and Jellybean sitting criss-cross-applesauce beside him, a few wisps of her blonde braid coming loose around her ears. The fire cracks and pops and snaps like breakfast cereal, and every so often Fred appears to give the logs a shove with one of the fireplace pokers. One of his records is turning on the stereo: Bing Crosby, David Bowie, Elton John. Archie is teaching the two of them how to spin the dreidel, and has laid down a flat piece of wood so it can spin properly. He and Jughead are close enough that their elbows brush when Archie moves to take his turn. Every time it happens, his heart gives a single traitorous thrill. 

“Why don’t you play with real money?” Jellybean wants to know. She picks a whole hazelnut out of their pot and crunches it with her back teeth. “Tens and twenties. You could make a killing.”

Before FP had started hitting the bottle full-time, he had taught Jellybean to play poker. It had turned her into a real card shark, much to Glady’s chagrin. Jughead’s mother was convinced they were going to get angry bikers showing up at their door, asking for the money her ten-year-old had won off of them. Jughead feels like Charlie Brown in the Christmas special. His baby sister, given over to commercialism. Tens and twenties, indeed. 

Archie just laughs and ruffles Jellybean’s hair up. “It’s not about the money, JB.” 

“What a load of baloney,” says Jellybean with a laugh. Her laugh is light, harmless, yet Jughead feels his heart sink. His little sister was not young or naive enough to do things for the spirit of the season. She wanted cold hard cash, and why not? Cash was a constant. You could pay for Pink Floyd albums with cash. You could have a home with cash, keep warm in the winter. 

“Your turn,” says Archie, and nudges Jughead with his shoulder. The motion makes heat rush into his cheeks. How had Jughead been friends with him for so long without imploding? He feels like a dying star. “Go ahead.” 

Jughead picks up the little top. It’s made of painted white wood, with silver symbols carved into each face. It’s old, but beautiful. Archie had told him once that it had belonged to his mother when she was a little girl. Jughead wondered why Mary hadn’t brought it with her when she left. If she ever missed it. (He wondered the same things, sometimes, about his own mother and himself). 

He spins it on the plank of wood, a wobbly one, but it goes for a long time before falling down. “Gimel!” cries Jellybean enthusiastically - she’d taught herself the Hebrew letters much quicker than Jughead had. “You get it all, Juggie!” 

Jughead slowly scoops the little pile of nuts and matchsticks toward himself. The weight of the holiday season seems to press into his back, bending his head down toward the carpet. His hand trembles. The Andrews house is decked out from head to toe, ablaze with mistletoe and candles and golden light. The piece de resistance is a massive real Christmas tree that twinkles with lights and infuses the air with the smell of pine. A giant golden star winks on the topmost branch. 

“Is Jughead cleaning us out of house and home?” Fred wants to know. He stops in the living room to watch them play, a smile on his lips. The light from the fire turns his hair auburn: he looks strong and loving and paternal and safe. For all the time that Jughead has laid claim to Fred as a parent figure, his presence has never hurt so much before, has never grated so deeply against the glaring void in his life. The hole in his heart named Mom, named Dad. 

The phone rings, and Archie hops up. “I’ll get it.” He runs into the kitchen like his ass is on fire. And then, once he’s sequestered cozily away behind the wall, his voice an octave lower than normal, Jughead hears him say: “Hi, Veronica.” 

Jughead has nothing against Veronica. He has nothing against Archie, for loving her, at Christmas. He has no one to blame but himself: he says nothing about his feelings, only feels and hopes in a confusing, swirling tide that seems to flow in his favour on some days and against him on other ones, bashing him unrelentingly against the craggy rocks of his heartbreak. 

Metaphors. Always metaphors. It was all he had. 

Jellybean is watching him, her eyes thoughtful and sharp, like she can guess why it hurts. His kid sister knows too much: it’s always been that way. If he could, he’d wrap a home up for Jellybean and put it under the Christmas tree, let her be a kid for the rest of her dwindling childhood. But those days are going fast, so he splits half of his dreidel winnings with her instead. She munches a handful of nuts and looks at him for a long time. 

When Archie hangs up the phone, Fred persuades Jellybean to watch  _ How The Grinch Stole Christmas  _ with him so the boys can have some time alone. Archie is usually glowing after a phone call with a girl. But this time he seems sad. He seats himself in the window, next to the fully lit menorah, and tucks his feet up. Something tugs in Jughead’s soul, like a fishing hook below his navel. He sits opposite Archie and tucks his feet up too. 

“Are you okay?” Jughead asks softly. 

“I miss my mom.” Archie wipes his face, and Jughead realizes with a start that tears are leaking down the cheek facing the window. His best friend stares out at the snow, his eyes watery. 

“Yeah,” says Jughead quietly. He resists the  _ me too. _ “I’m sorry, dude.” 

“Do you ever feel like…” Archie rests the side of his forehead against the window, now. The heat from his body smudges the glass with fog. “Like Christmas stopped feeling like Christmas at some point? Like it’s different, now?” 

“Yeah,” agrees Jughead. “Growing up, I guess.” 

It’s the logical, unsentimental answer. Archie looks at him with sad eyes. Archie had wanted sentiment. Archie had wanted Christmas magic to be something you could mend and rediscover, something that would come back to him if he waited long enough. His fingers twitch and Jughead aches to hold them. 

“I guess it’s just since the divorce,” Archie says, and presses his cheek to his hand. “I dunno, man. My dad tries. And I feel ungrateful wanting more, but- 

“Trust me, I know.” Jughead scoots his feet a little closer to Archie’s on the windowseat. “For me it was when my dad started drinking again. We didn’t put up a tree that year. I don’t think we have since.” 

“Do your foster parents have a tree?” Archie wants to know. Jughead can see him yearning with the want to fix things. If the Malloys didn’t have a tree, Archie would have gone out and cut one down with his bare hands and dragged it to them. Archie was like that. 

“Yeah,” replies Jughead - Mr. Malloy had put it up a week ago, for Jellybean’s sake, as tiredly as a store-owner mounting his tenth window display. Still, wasn’t it was more than Jughead had done for her: shouldn’t he have noticed weeks ago that her boots were falling apart? “And there’s the construction tree. That’s ours, really.” 

Archie’s face scrunches up in a smile, like he’s five again. Archie had always loved the construction tree, their own private myth when they were kids, tangled in love and joy and the trust they had in their fathers. Archie loved playing Santa. The tree was the kind of hard-working, middle-class fairytale that Archie’s life had been laid out to be since he was born. 

Their fingers have landed close to one another on the windowseat. Jughead inches his hand imperceptibly closer, thinking that just to feel his warmth would be enough, just to brush the barest of touches against the hairs on Archie’s knuckles. But Archie moves his hand so it’s on top of Jughead’s, his thumb rubbing circles on Jughead’s skin, and Jughead’s breath stills in his throat. 

They sit like that for a long time in the gold light from the menorah, hands linked, Archie looking out at the snow and Jughead forgetting how to breathe. 

* * *

**December 17**

The Chok’lit shop is crowded, the windows fogged with the heat of so many bodies. A long line of people in mitts and hats and unzipped jackets snakes from the counter all the way to the door, where a sprig of mistletoe joins the dangling gold bell. Pop and his workers are busy behind the counter, flipping burgers, shaking out fries, whipping ice cream and garnishing shakes. The second charity tree is smack in the middle of the place - sparkling balls of silver, red, blue, gold, and green nestled among the white paper ornaments. Jughead inhales the smell of sugar and grease, and thinks peculiarly that this restaurant has been the closest thing to a home for him for the past year. 

Jughead had stepped in for a post-Christmas-shopping milkshake - he had $2.25 left over after Jellybean’s album and Fred’s CD and Archie’s gift: a vintage poster for the first movie they’d ever seen together at the Twilight. Jughead joins the queue, sliding his hands into his pockets and fingering the last of the change, wondering if he should have sprung for something for Pop Tate as well. Coins feel heavy in his pockets, after all this time. Part of him has never forgotten being homeless and hungry and counting out spare change on the floor of the Twilight projector booth or the school maintenance closet. Two dollars and ten cents got you a can of soup and a day-old bun you could call dinner. 

Ahead of him in line, Reggie Mantle is standing with his family, all three of them looking like they’d stepped out of advertisements for an upscale holiday catalogue. Reggie’s broad back is to Jughead, and he’s standing behind his parents, eyes turned in a bored way toward the menu. The cashmere scarf wound around his neck looks like it could probably pay the Malloys’ rent for a year. Jughead looks at the floor, just in case they lock eyes by accident. 

“What is this!?” A loud, angry voice interrupts his thoughts. Jughead looks back up to see Marty Mantle yanking one of the paper ornaments toward him, bending the tree branch over. He winces. Reggie’s eyes are suddenly wide and worried, like he’s uncertain of how to do damage control. He looks away. “What is this!!?” 

Unfortunately, one of Pop’s waitresses, a perky redhead with a holiday pin on her lapel, overhears. “It’s a Children’s Wish Tree,” Jughead hears her explain, her big fake customer-service smile in place. “Children in need put their Christmas wishes on the-” 

Marty is enraged, cutting her off there. “Children in need! This is a scam, is what it is!” He tears the ornament off the tree by the ribbon, trying to rile up the people closest to him in line. Most look at their feet or away, embarrassed, but another man nods thoughtfully. “Charity! I take my family out for a nice dinner, and I’m asked to pay for some little brat’s Christmas gift!” 

Pop looks up from behind the counter at the noise, and Jughead feels his cheeks flood with red. He stares at the floor, his palms damp and his hands shaking. Reggie, ahead of him, wants to disappear. His shoulders hunch in, his pale face turned to his shoes. Reggie’s petite mother, Melinda, only looks bored. She looks around the place, her smile bright and fake, as though she has no idea what’s happening. Or as though this is business as usual. 

“I did my tree by Williams-Sonoma this year,” she says brightly to the woman next to her. “All gold and white. With ribbon.” 

Marty is reading the ornament out loud. “Some sixteen year old wants a pair of Air Jordans! Reggie, I bought you those last year! They cost one hundred and sixty dollars!” He waves the ornament in the air. “What has this ungrateful welfare brat done to earn my one hundred and sixty dollars? They should be grateful with whatever they get! This is the biggest sham I’ve ever heard in my life!” 

Some of the people near him are defensive. “I think it’s a wonderful idea,” says a woman cooly, taking two ornaments off the tree. “In fact, I think I’ll buy some gifts myself.” 

“I agree,” says Moose’s father, stripping another ornament and glancing at the tag. He shoots a deep glare at the Mantle family. “It’s very noble.” 

“Go ahead!” Marty shoots back. “You’re putting Air Jordans on some social worker’s kid, mark my words.” 

Jughead’s appetite has all but vanished. He looks longingly behind him, where people are craning their necks to see what the ruckus is. Maybe he could make a run for it. 

“Sir, you’re welcome to leave,” says the redheaded waitress. Her smile has disappeared. 

“Get some Christmas spirit!” yells a man from the back of the line. Melinda Mantle shifts from foot to foot, the fake smile still stretched on her face, looking uncomfortable at last. Her gloved hands reach for her husband’s arm, clutching it tight. 

“This is the living end!” Marty hisses, ripping a new ornament from the branch and ignoring his wife. 

“Marty-” Melinda tries. Marty turns on her. 

“What does this town expect of us, Melinda? It’s not enough that I’m spending my good money on this establishment so the economy in our small town doesn’t tank! Now I’m supposed to buy some orphan hundred-and-sixty dollar shoes while I’m at it!” 

“Sir-” the waitress tries again, her voice icy, but Marty cuts her off. 

“Oh, don’t worry, I’m leaving. Come on Reggie,” Marty booms, his voice echoing through the crowded room. “We’re eating down the street.” 

Every eye in the diner is on Reggie Mantle. His head sinks down into his cashmere scarf like a turtle. It’s so quiet Jughead can hear thawing snow dripping on the floor. 

“Ridiculous,” says Marty, immune to the staring, and rips the ornament into three pieces. 

“A lovely tree, though,” says Melinda, too loud, as the family walks toward the door. She looks affirmingly over at Pop Tate. “Lovely colours.” 

Reggie’s gaze doesn’t leave his feet. When the front door slams, the bell jingles merrily behind them. 

* * *

**December 21st**

The Christmas tree in the middle of Pop’s sparkles and glows in the afternoon sunlight. The days are shorter now, so the sun’s rays are longer and more golden: stretching in orange fingers across the linoleum floor. Beneath the tree, an overflowing box that had lived under Fred’s desk in the trailer until now houses a cavalcade of gifts wrapped in garish wrapping paper and sticky tape: stuffed animals, legos, winter clothing, a scooter, toys of all sizes. 

The construction tree had been empty for a week, and the tree at Pop’s was almost as barren. Archie and Jellybean are on their knees on the floor, a huge spool of paper between them, decorating the items that had been donated unwrapped. Only three tags remain, gleaming white on the green branches. Fred reads them and writes them down on a yellow notepad. 

“Courtney gets her soccer ball,” Jellybean speaks up, informing the room as she tries to wrestle the ball in question into a gift bag. “And Susan got her Super Mario game.” 

The diner is warm, cozy, familiar. They feel like a family - Archie, Jughead, Jellybean, Fred. Pop, who’s serving them up free milkshakes while they work. Fred is being more affectionate than usual. Every so often he ruffles up Archie’s hair or smooches him on the head. Archie ducks away from these touches, but with a smile. 

“What happens with the wishes that didn’t get picked?” Jellybean wants to know. She sits up on her knees, playing nervously with a spool of ribbon. 

“We got some cash donations,” Fred replies. “No one gets left out.” 

Jughead tries not to think of things that hurt, the way you leave a wound alone to heal. But he thinks of FP anyway, in his cell somewhere, and the wound prickles, burns. Fred is making many trips out to load toys in his truck, and the bell jangles merrily against the mistletoe every time. 

The next time the door opens, the click of high heels on linoleum sounds out in the small space. Archie leaps to his feet, his wrapping forgotten. 

“Veronica!” 

“Merry Christmas!” Veronica exclaims, her voice muffled somewhat by the extravagant fur stole wrapped around her shoulders and up toward her nose. Over the fluffy whiteness of it, her hair and glittering eyes are as glossy black as night. “I brought reinforcements!” 

“Wha-” Archie begins to ask, but he only gets that far: with another exuberant jingle, the front door of Pop’s gives way to a stream of mitten-clad Pop’s regulars: Chuck, Moose, Kevin, Midge, Betty, Josie, Valerie, Melody, and even Reggie Mantle, laden down with gift bags. Chuck has an artist set and a box of coloured pencils on the top of his stack. Reggie is holding what definitely looks like a pair of size-ten Air Jordans. 

Fred’s smile when he walks back in and sees the swarm of teenagers is as bright and as radiant as a star. Jellybean claps her hands and laughs her head off, like Veronica’s done a magic trick. She may as well have. She may not fit the suit, but Veronica Lodge would make a hell of a Santa Claus. 

It’s Jughead alone who feels cheated. 

It’s not that he’s bitter. It’s just that the construction tree is their  _ thing _ , his one chance a year to slip into the Andrews family for a day and be welcomed. Not to be outshone by Veronica and her indomitable credit card. He should be happy that she’s here, that kids are getting their sneakers and scooters and soccer balls, but the part of him that’s more Scrooge than Santa  _ throbs.  _

And he wishes. Oh, god, he wishes. 

Wishes Archie would look at him like that - wishes that he could be the one to pull a Christmas miracle out of thin air. Wishes even that he could fit in with his peers: this jolly, riotous, cheery-cheeked crowd who were attacking the ribbon and bows table, white paper ornaments clutched in each of their fists. Wishes Fred’s hand would land on his head and ruffle his hair just once. Wishes most of all that Archie and Veronica weren’t  _ quite _ so close under the mistletoe. 

_ If wishes were horses, beggars would ride _ , FP used to say. All right. 

Archie hops up on a bench, calling out instructions. “Okay, everyone, wrap your gift and make sure you attach the gift tag! If it’s breakable, leave it on one of the booths and if it’s not, put it in one of the boxes under the tree.” He breaks off there, smiling goofily, his red hair in disarray and his grin as luminous as a movie theatre marquee. Yet Jughead thinks just for a moment of the tears in his best friend’s eyes in front of the menorah, and it hurts to remember. 

What was Christmas really about? Happiness? Or pretending? Or some awful, complex mish-mash of the two, where you scraped what happiness you could get, second-hand, and hoped with all your heart that it was enough? 

Jellybean had filled out her second Christmas tag - Jughead had seen it hanging on the lower branches of the Malloy’s Christmas tree. She had written the words in purple gel pen: JB, age 10, wants her family back. 

No cash donation was going to cover that one. 

While Archie is sorting through gift tags, Veronica drags him into a corner of the Chok’lit shop. Her french perfume tickles his nostrils as she leans in close 

“What does Archie want for Christmas?” she whispers conspiratorially. 

“He’s your boyfriend,” Jughead shoots back, a little too sharp. “You tell me.” 

Veronica’s perfect brows slide together, her lips crooking into a little smile, enough to make Jughead feel embarrassed, and then annoyed for being embarrassed. “Archie and I aren’t together.” 

“He likes you,” Jughead says. Veronica shakes her head. 

“He likes other things too.” 

“What are you talking about?” 

“He -” Veronica hesitates. “If he didn’t tell you it’s not my place to say.” 

“Tell me what?” 

But she makes a zipping lips motion and turns away, snatching up a pair of scissors and dutifully trying to help Reggie curl ribbon. Jughead drifts back toward his little sister, her head bent over the project of wrapping a complex-shaped barbie doll RV. His fingers toy with the back of her braid, gently, and she smiles up at him. 

“Help me out, kid Kerouac,” she says. “Don’t just stand there.” 

They work well into the evening, long after the golden rays of sunlight have filtered down into nothing. Fred is loading the back of his truck for the last time when the group of teenagers finally sweeps out, leaving a mess of wrapping paper and dirty milkshake glasses in their wake. Pop insists that he can handle the cleaning up, but Archie volunteers to stay behind anyway, letting Jellybean lay claim to the passenger seat of the truck with a mighty cry of “SHOTGUN!” 

“I’ll stay with Pop,” Jughead volunteers, nodding at Fred and his sister. “See you guys later.” 

As Christmas carols play fuzzily out of the old jukebox, they sweep the floor and bag the garbage. Pop disappears into the backroom and leaves them alone together, flicking the fluorescent lights off as he goes so that the neon glow is all they can see by. It’s a familiar routine -  _ JugheadandArchie _ , pretzeled together again. Archie has the mop in his hands, scrubbing fruitlessly at a patch of very clean linoleum. His gleeful spirit has sunk somewhat, his eyes trained downward, toward his work. 

“What’s up with you?” Jughead asks, Veronica’s words nagging at the back of his mind. Bluntness has always been his strong suit. Easier that way. 

“Nothing,” 

“Arch.” 

Archie pauses in his work, and something unspoken seems to pass in the air between them, the same something that had hung heavily between their bodies in the window seat. His best friend swallows. “Nothing, it’s just -” 

He leaves that _ just  _ hanging in the air for a very long time. Snow gusts against the window panes. The Eagles cry on the jukebox: 

_ bells will be ringing the sad sad news / oh what a christmas to have the blues  _

Archie sucks in a deep breath. 

“I came out to my dad today.” 

“What?” 

“I told him that…” A curl of hair has fallen in front of Archie’s eyes. He pushes it back. “I’m - you know. Bisexual.” 

It’s stupid that it hits so hard. Only he  _ hadn’t  _ known. Thinks of Archie sticking up for him all the times that he’d been called names - had never realized that there was more to it than Archie’s fierce loyalty. 

“Oh,” is all that Jughead can manage. 

“He was cool with it. Obviously.” There’s a question in Archie’s eyes that Jughead can’t answer, maybe didn’t  _ want _ to answer until now. “I mean, there’s nothing wrong with it.” 

“No,” Jughead agrees, feeling oddly like he’s answering the question. His fingers shake. “There’s not.” 

There’s a box of unused tags sitting open on one of the booths. Jughead reaches out and runs his trembling fingers across them, the white paper smooth under his touch. He imagines muddying one with his own wish, spilling it onto the clean tag. Jughead, 16, wants- 

Wants-  

Suddenly all he can think about is the mistletoe. It draws his eyes above the door like a car accident. He hadn’t realized they’d drifted so close to it. 

“You didn’t fill one out, huh?” Archie asks, changing the subject. Jughead looks at him - his cheeks, his lips, the little creases around his eyes - and the _ wish _ fills him, as cool and as strong and as pure as the peal of a bell. 

Jughead shakes his head and Archie nods in response, slowly. The neon of the diner slices colours into his hair. 

“What do you want?” Archie asks, and Jughead sees the need to fix things burning in his eyes, thinks of Fred’s words -  _ No one gets left out.  _ Archie is going to charge out to the store and get him anything he asks for, just so that Christmas can mean something,  _ anything, _ just so Jughead has a lick of a chance of finishing their English assignment - 

Jughead was not born brave. 

Jellybean was the brave one: the one who did swan dives off the board at the community pool without looking, who fearlessly flew down the ramps at the skate park even when they ended up dumping her onto her knees. Jughead’s mother was the brave one: packing up and moving to Toledo when she decided _ enough was enough.  _ Even FP had courage in him, the old type, the kind rolled up in beer and blood and whiskey and leaving home too young. Compared to all this courage, Jughead has always felt inadequate somehow - small and still against their loudness. 

Oh, but if Jughead could be anything, if he could have anything for Christmas, it would be the courage to just- 

To just -  

A million things seem to pass between them before it happens, the kind of unspoken things that only best friends can read, and then Jughead leans toward him somehow and kisses him. Archie had time to turn his head away - could have shut his lips together or pushed Jughead’s face, but he doesn’t, even kisses him back, hesitantly, like he’s still figuring out how. His mouth tastes like the creamy-sweetness of the eggnog he’s been drinking, his lips frighteningly soft, and there’s some kind of charge about kissing him that Jughead hadn’t expected - an itch that runs under his skin all the way down to his chest, prickly and ticklish and hot. 

There’s no describing a kiss like that - no word that Jughead can think of in his expansive vocabulary other than  _ perfect. _ It’s over too soon, and then there’s a beat of space in the shop between them - a stillness between their two mouths, breathing each other's air - and then they’re kissing again, like this is something they’ve been meaning to do for a long time. 

He closes his eyes for this one, lets the neon haze of the diner and the bright pinpoints of Christmas lights fade from his view. He feels invincible, forgetting that Pop Tate is only in the other room and can easily walk in on them kissing, that Archie’s dad and his kid sister are probably rattling back up Main Street right at this second. He could have spent hours just like this, drinking in the sugary eggnog taste of Archie’s mouth, that expansive, burning feeling of courage in his chest and arms and blood.  

Then Archie’s touching him too, hands circling his wrists, tracing up and down his forearms - Archie’s hands were always warm, even in the winter, unerringly so. His mouth is the same way: hot and soft and he pulls Jughead against him - Jughead moves one of his hands at the same time so that his loosely curled fist ends up trapped against the broad muscle of Archie’s chest. He can feel his friend’s heartbeat thumping hard through the fabric as Archie’s tongue teases uncertainty along his upper lip, the hairs raising at the back of his neck at the unfamiliar feeling. 

He kisses Archie Andrews, Archie of the construction tree and his father’s need to fix things, Archie who played video games with him and ate sliced pear with him at the kitchen island, who’d never learned not to take pizza out of the over before it had cooled. Archie who could have had any girl in the school he wanted, but who hadn’t, who had kissed Jughead, tonight. 

It feels like home. It feels like coming to a place you’d always known was home, but now it was really yours, was really -

The bell jingles above the door. 

They’re smack in front of the mistletoe so Fred and Jellybean have all of two seconds to walk in and realize what they’re seeing. Archie and Jughead break apart as Fred half-gasps and half turns away, so that Jughead can’t tell what he’s thinking -  _ like father like son, _ maybe  - FP has loose lips about what he and Fred Andrews used to get up to back in their school days. 

But Jellybean is overjoyed. “YES!!” she cheers, jumping up and down in her boots. “I knew it!! I knew it!!” She streams to Archie and hugs him around the middle before twirling back to Fred’s side, elated. “I knew you two were-” 

“Jellybean, let’s uh-” Fred is tugging frantically, on her mitten, his eyes on Archie, the two of them communicating silently in that way they did. Both of their cheeks are pink. “Let’s go get some -” 

“Boy, are you lucky!” Jellybean tells Archie, her triumphant voice drowning out whatever excuse Fred is about to invent. “My brother’s a great boyfriend. Hey, you better take care of him, okay? You better treat him good, cause if you don’t-” She makes a small fist and shakes it. “I’m gonna kick your ass. And my mom too. And once my dad gets out of prison-” 

Fred all but carries her out the door. 

Archie turns to Jughead when it bangs shut, the flush still on his cheeks, but hidden under the neon. Their faces are closer than they’ve been in a long time, and Jughead finds himself seeking out familiar freckles, admiring the very thin sweep of red hairs on Archie’s upper lip, even as caution rushes into his voice, the uncertainty of never having anything this good. 

“It doesn’t have to be anything-” Jughead begins worriedly, his voice wavering. “It can just be something stupid we did, you don’t have to worry-” 

“What if I want it to be?” Archie’s face comes closer, and it’s something like looking into the sun. “What if I want to do it again?” 

Jughead looks down at the floor and then back up, rapidly, trying to dislodge the sheen of tears he can feel creeping over his vision. “Then good,” he chokes out, “because that’s what I want too.” 

Archie does the most surprising thing, then. He hugs him. And it’s not surprising, because they’re best friends, but because they haven’t hugged like this in awhile and because it’s somehow more intimate and more sacred than the kiss had been. Jughead grips him back and hugs him with all his might and Archie’s lips land against his forehead, their bodies twisted together again, like when they were eight years old at the pool,  _ ArchieandJughead _ , no one else. 

Bing Crosby’s voice drifts out of the jukebox, out into the space between them: 

_ You’re all I want for Christmas _

_ All I want my whole life through,  _

_ Each day is just like Christmas,  _

_ Anytime that I’m with you _

* * *

**December 25th**

Jellybean gets her Pink Floyd CD for Christmas - a whole box set of them, actually, and they’ll later learn it was Reggie Mantle who had drawn her tag. She unwraps her vinyl album and cheers, and kisses Jughead with a big, unselfconscious smack on the cheek under the Christmas tree. 

The Malloys gift her with something astonishingly beautiful: a real blue-and-white record player - the portable kind that folded up into a suitcase. It had been Mrs. Malloy’s when she was a girl, and when they’d taken it out of storage it had been full of dust and had run too slow. Mr. Malloy had spent the last few weeks in the garage, taking it apart and putting it back together so that it worked. 

Jellybean spends the whole day listening to her records, folding it up and carrying it around, and Jughead stares at the Malloys as though he has never seen them before: these two people who he had never thought of as family and yet who had tried so hard for them, harder than his own family had. 

Jughead gets nothing so special - a blank journal and schoolbooks, and a pair of socks, but he recognizes that those things cost money and that the Malloys had gone to every length to give him a Christmas. He thanks them both, honestly, and can see their surprise - Jughead’s  _ thank yous  _ are always bitter and surly, unpleasant for both parties. They smile at each other and squeeze hands on the threadbare sofa. 

Jughead’s real gift shows up halfway through the day, leaning on the horn in his father’s truck down at the base of the Malloy’s driveway. 

“We’re going for a ride to look at Christmas lights,” Jellybean hollers, streaking to the window, and Mrs. Malloy says okay, that they’ll have lunch on when they get back. 

Jughead makes sure his sister is wearing her mitts and hat and new boots before they squeeze into the cab of the already-warm pickup, Jughead is in the middle this time, his thighs pressed up against Archie’s thighs from the close quarters. Jellybean shoves her CD greedily into the player, ignoring Archie’s half-hearted protests about wanting to hear some Christmas music for the last day, and Archie exchanges a secret smile with Jughead that makes the ticklish, itchy warmth rush back into his veins, radiating from the place their legs touched. 

They’re rolling down Main Street when he takes Jughead’s hand, driving past Riverdale High when their fingers lace together, and slowing to a stop in the cul-de-sac where Reggie lived when Archie leans in quick and kisses his cheek, the way he must have learned from Fred and Mary (formerly  _ FredandMary _ , pretzeled together) growing up in the backseat. Jellybean stares wistfully out the window and pretends not to notice, though Jughead catches just a glimpse of her smile. The cab of the truck is warm with the heater and all of their bodies, and a word that he hasn’t thought of for a very long time drifts into his head, Christmas-clear, like a bell ringing. 

_ Home _ , he thinks, squeezing Archie’s hot hand in his cold one.  _ This is home.  _


End file.
